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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29982897">Crows</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Modest_K/pseuds/Modest_K'>Modest_K</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Blood, Crows, Dark, Death, Discord: Harry Potter Fanfic Club, Family Loss, Fear, Fear of Flying, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Harry Potter Next Generation, Horror, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Not Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Compliant, Poor Albus bb, Psychological Horror, Sort Of, Trauma, harry potter fanfiction club challenge, quidditch pitch</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 17:34:41</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,325</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29982897</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Modest_K/pseuds/Modest_K</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Still reeling from an accident, Albus attempts to fly for the first time in months.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Scorpius Malfoy/Albus Severus Potter</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>31</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Crows</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em> A crow dives toward the ground, rapidly, as if swooping to attack a threat who’s come too close.  </em>
</p><p>Albus took an unsteady breath. </p><p>He actually considered it rather <em> helpful </em> that he couldn’t see the ground. </p><p>Fog rolled over the Pitch, the dampness making his hair stick to his forehead. He was decidedly certain that being able to see the grass down below him would be worse than this. He could scarcely see much of <em> anything, </em>really. That was good; seeing nothing at all was oddly safe. </p><p>
  <em> Another crow soars past his face, its feathers thick and billowing.  </em>
</p><p>He flinched once, his fingers instinctively gripping the handle a little tighter. Another shaky breath followed before he grit his teeth and glared into the fog. </p><p>
  <em> Black feathers nearly sweep across his cheek as another crow dives.  </em>
</p><p>“Come on,” Albus growled at himself. He released the broom to stretch out one hand, and then the other, the bite of the morning air making it a little harder to unclench his fist than it should have been. </p><p>Of course, the fear wasn’t helping either. </p><p>Albus resecured his hold on the broom, but once again remained in place, not trusting himself to move. </p><p>He’d prepared for a long ascent earlier, having pictured himself freezing periodically with each meter he’d gain. He figured it’d take him hours. In actuality it’d only taken seconds, his panic throwing him into a fight-or-flight reaction that he really wasn’t proud of. He’d launched up into the sky in a fit of trepidation, desperate to get deep enough into the morning haze that the ground would disappear. </p><p>And it had indeed vanished. Albus had always been the type to fear what was in front of him more than what he couldn’t see. Delusion was a powerful evasion tool, and no ground in sight meant no ground at all. </p><p>
  <em> Again a crow speeds by.  </em>
</p><p>“It’s been long enough,” he breathed to himself. “It’s been long enough.” <em> A mantra, that ought to do it </em> — <em> to drive them away. To make this work.  </em></p><p>
  <em> Whoosh.  </em>
</p><p>Albus wavered. Circe, he felt like a coward. He’d been flying since he could walk, yet here he was now, too scared to move. He wasn’t sure whether to attribute his fear to two months without practice, the dark gloom of such an early morning, the eerily silent crows, or… or the other thing. </p><p>And then, rather than just the occasional bird dashing by him every couple minutes to further his already incapacitating dread, suddenly there were so many <em> more. </em>Crows hurtled by him, emerging from the thick fog like unforecasted rain. </p><p>The crows began to divebomb the pitch. Giant black blurs falling to the earth, <em> whoosh, whoosh, </em> and yet another, <em> whoosh.  </em></p><p>Albus forced himself to face forward, the cold starting to sting. “Just fly,” he implored himself. He needed to move, at the very least to warm himself up. </p><p>His body refused.</p><p>It wasn’t a lack of ability— maybe it’d been a bit since he’d last been on a broom, but his muscle memory should have been enough to carry him forward. Yet there he sat, high up in the air, paralyzed and powerless. </p><p>How had he <em> ever </em>believed he was ready for this? </p><p>The crows’ proximity started to worry him as they grew closer with each descent. </p><p>One flew so close it nearly hit him, and as he cringed away, a face flashed against the fog. </p><p>Albus stared at it in horror, his arms still raised to his head to protect himself from the diving birds. The massive, blurred face was mangled, bruised and bloody, its mouth open wide as it screamed soundlessly. </p><p>Albus lowered his arms to grab hold of the broom and tightened his grip once more, and continued to do so until it hurt too much to strain any harder. </p><p>Another crow flew by. The face popped up again, lasting longer as its features became more clear, the hazel of the eyes now hauntingly recognizable. </p><p>Albus’s heartbeat thundered over the wind, his bones turning to jelly, and his throat tightening until he could scarcely breathe.</p><p>“Stop,” Albus whispered. “Please, just— just go away or— <em> agh! </em>” </p><p>The crash shook him out of his daze, and he glared after the crow that’d collided into him so strongly. </p><p>“Stupid, bloody—” </p><p><em> BAM! </em> For every three or four that passed, one of the dark birds would clap him across the face as they plummeted toward the ground that Albus <em> still </em>couldn’t see. </p><p>Panic started to set in. He couldn’t fly, <em> he couldn’t fly, not yet, he couldn’t, </em>but what were his other options? He kept one arm out to shield himself, the other clinging to his broom desperately, but it didn’t matter. His attempts at blocking them were continuously futile, and the birds continued to rap him across the cheek.</p><p>When the next crow hit him, it was strong enough that Albus rapidly spun out to the right.</p><p>It took him a moment to understand how that was possible, crows not being particularly big animals, but then he noticed. </p><p>The birds were growing in size as they dropped. </p><p>They began small, the way a normal crow would appear, but then they’d suddenly <em> grow, </em>becoming bigger and bigger the closer they got to Albus. The range wasn’t long, as the fog still clouded most of the sky, but the growth was evident, and too significant to be credited to perspective.</p><p>And by the time they reached him, they were large, larger than he was. Large enough to knock the wind out of Albus time and time again, running into him not in a dive as he’d thought before but in a chaotic spiral. Crow after crow came spinning toward him, wood spitting everywhere as the dark birds crashed into Albus and spun him away forcefully. </p><p>Wood?</p><p>
  <em> “Get up!” </em>
</p><p>Albus grunted at each hit, stunned as he spun out rightward in a repetitive loop. It happened again. A streak of jet black feathers, a hit to the face, and then the spin. Again. <em> Again. </em>And so it continued, a flash of black, a hit, a spin. </p><p>The face returned with each hit as well, wide hazel eyes, horrified and desperate, blood gushing from every orifice and the wood of a broken broom everywhere.</p><p>
  <em> “Get up!” </em>
</p><p>Albus’s broom wasn’t broken (<em>where the hell is the wood from—? </em>), but it continued to spin out with each impact, just after the streak of black.</p><p>Black, hit, spin. It repeated until the speed and frequency of crows began to pick up. The flash of black lengthened with each hit and spin until suddenly it was all he could see, this sheet of <em> darkness </em> . But the others, the hit and the spin, those he could still <em> feel, </em>and he felt them over and over again, knocking him around the darkness. </p><p>
  <em> Hit—  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Spin—  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Hit—  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Spin—  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> “Watch the bludger—” </em>
</p><p>
  <em> HIT—  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> Wood splintered off everywhere. </em>
</p><p>
  <em> SPIN—  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> “James!” </em>
</p><p>“Albus!” </p><p>
  <em> So much blood. </em>
</p><p>
  <em> HIT—  </em>
</p><p>
  <em> “James get up!” </em>
</p><p>
  <em> SPIN—  </em>
</p><p>“ALBUS!”</p><p>Albus gasped for air, and they were gone. </p><p>There wasn’t a crow in sight. The sky was… clear. No clouds, no fog. No faces in the sky, no blood, no wood. Just a soft, pale blue. </p><p>Not unlike the wide eyes of the boy staring at him with worry. Albus took them in dazedly for a moment before letting his own wander over to something behind the other boy. </p><p>He paled, whimpering softly. </p><p>Scorpius reached for him. “Al, hey, it’s okay. I told you we could try this another day— flying will be here whenever you’re ready.”</p><p>Albus trembled, still staring over his boyfriend’s shoulder.</p><p>“What do you see?” Scorpius asked quietly, gently holding the petrified boy steady. </p><p>Albus blinked, his eyes burning in the process. His breath came hitched and sharp tears cut into his cheeks in the brisk morning air. </p><p>
  <em> Whoosh—</em>
</p><p>
  <em>A flash of black—</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Hazel eyes—  </em>
</p><p>When his voice finally arrived, it came as the barest of whispers, little more than a choked breath. </p><p>“<em>Crows. </em>”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Oops</p></blockquote></div></div>
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